It’s not that Lemmy is degenerating, it’s that Beehaw is choosing to block sh.itjust.works and Lemmy.world, which means those two are no longer able to federate to Beehaw, and vice-versa. So to that end, they’re degenerating. Beehaw will keep federating content to other instances (like how I read this from FMHY, and am commenting from FMHY, which you can read).
Hopefully that helps
I like the concept, and so far I like the implementation, but it’s still far too early to gain mass adoption based on what I’m seeing from bugs (account creation silently failed on multiple instances, and login can also silently fail) as well as how registering can feel like jumping through hoops. I wanted to register for beehaw but don’t much care to go through an interview process. Then I wanted to make sure I could access beehaw content, but saw they recently defederated from lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works, so I had to make sure not to register on either of those.
I don’t know this will catch on. Currently each instance is so small, and the communities are even smaller. I worry that content won’t update often enough to warrant checking more than once or twice a day. We’ll have to wait and see how much this all grows and matures. I’d like this to be my Reddit replacement, but we’ll see.
I, personally, don’t feel that adding friction is the answer. I also opted not to apply to join Beehaw because I think having arbitrary criteria to join is problematic. I like the idea that the mods care so much, but it’s simply unsustainable. That and I don’t believe that creating a bubble of like-minded people is healthy. Having terms of service and a code of conduct is one thing. Having an interview process is unappealing to me, and leads me to wonder how that community has gotten as big as it has. The answer is likely “slow growth”.;
Take that for what you will. I would love to join Beehaw, but refuse to jump through hoops. Frankly, you need me more than I need you. Either you play a part in Lemmy’s growth, or you add so much friction that people choose to walk away. Lemmy’s hard enough already with all the bugs and the half-baked features. Adding more friction will defer newcomers further. Is it a win to deter a potential Lemmy user from adopting the platform?